Workplace Natural Hair Experiment

1BlessedNatural: Workplace Natural Hair Experiment

The Experiment

Over the past 3 years, my sister C has been performing an experiment to see how her co-workers would react to her natural hair in her workplaces, and the results may surprise you.

Three years ago, C started working at a retail location where she wore her natural hair out for the first 3 months at the job. She received a compliment from one woman about her plaits, but no one else said anything. When she switched to wearing a long straight haired wig, guys were coming out of the woodwork complimenting her. The funniest part was that this included co-workers who saw her everyday. C pointed out to one of the guys that he never spoke to her when she was wearing her natural hair. So, why would he do it now for a wig?

Let's fast forward to a about 4 months ago...C started working at a factory, and wore her Afro everyday for the first month. After getting tired of doing her hair, she put on another wig with long straight hair. On day one, C received cat calls and compliments from different co-workers on her way into the building and all day long. Again, most of these reactions were from male co-workers who saw her everyday and never said a word. The female co-workers mainly asked her what did she do to get her wig to be silky and straight. C was disappointed by the reactions, and I will tell you why in a minute.

One of her male co-workers told her that he was being turned on by the way her hair moved, because none of the other women's ~~weaves~~ hair moved like that while they were working. What? Okay. After one guy complimented her, she asked him why was he so fascinated with her hair when it's just a wig. He told her she didn't even look Black, she looked mixed (like looking Black was a bad thing). Another guy followed behind her while sending compliments and gasped when she turned around, and he saw she was the same person he saw every day. Oops!

A Note on the Results

C said she learned a lot from her experiment. She was amazed to see that a lot men were still fascinated with long straight hair. Plus, it was not even her own. She said the comment about looking mixed as opposed to Black was made as if looking Black was less attractive. Because of her experiences, C believes we still have a while to go as far as beauty standards in this country, and I agree. Author, Michelle McKinney Hammond posted a timely status to Facebook from her book titled Secrets to a Man's Heart that seemed to explain a lot about C's experiment. She said, 'When it comes to attraction, men are more primarily moved by what they see. Sometimes this blinds them to important essentials when it comes to women...'The natural hair movement is great, but we still have a lot progress to be made.

When it comes to attraction, men are more primarily moved by what they see. Sometimes this blinds them to important...
Posted by Michelle McKinney Hammond on Friday, November 27, 2015

What do you think about the results of C's workplace natural hair experiment?

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